Steady Thermal Convection from a Concentrated Source in a Porous Medium

Abstract

Solutions for the steady, axisymmetric velocity and temperature fields associated with a point source of thermal energy in a fluid-saturated porous medium are obtained numerically through use of similarity transformations. The two cases considered are those of a point source located on the lower, insulated boundary of a semi-infinite region and a point source embedded in an infinite region. Numerical results are presented from which complete descriptions of the velocity and temperature fields can be constructed for Rayleigh numbers of 0.1, 1.0, 10.0, and 100.0.